MANUAL OP THK APIARY. 301 



HONEY-COMB CORAL. 



A very common fossil found in many parts of the Eastern 

 and Northern United States, is, from its appearance, often 

 called petrified honey-comb. We have many such specimens 

 in our museum. In some cases the cells are hardly larger 

 than a pin-head ; in others a quarter of an inch in diameter. 



These (Fig. 132) are not fossil honey-comb as many are led 

 to believe, though the resemblance is so striking that no 

 wonder that the public generally are deceived. These speci- 

 mens are fossil coral, \yhich the paleontologist places in the 

 genus Favosites ; favosus being a common species in our State. 

 They are very abundant in the lime rock in northern Michi- 



FiG. 132. 



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J 



gan, and are very properly denominated honey-stone coi-al. 

 The animals of which these were once the skeletons, so to 

 speak, are not insects at all, though often called so by men 

 of considerable information. It would be no greater blunder 

 to call an oyster or a clam an insect. 



The species of the genus Favosites first appeared in the 

 Upper Silurian rocks, culminated in the Devonian, and disap- 

 peared in the early Carboniferous. No insects appeared till 

 the Devonian age, and no Hymenoptera — ^bees, wasps, etc. — 

 till after the Carboniferous. So the old-time Favosites reared 



